Echolalia

Echolalia is the unsolicited repetition of vocalizations made by another person (when repeated by the same person, it is called palilalia). In its profound form it is automatic and effortless. It is one of the echophenomena, closely related to echopraxia, the automatic repetition of movements made by another person; both are "subsets of imitative behavior" whereby sounds or actions are imitated "without explicit awareness". Echolalia may be an immediate reaction to a stimulus or may be delayed. Echolalia occurs in many cases of autism spectrum disorder and Tourette syndrome. It may also occur in several other neurological conditions such as some forms of dementia or stroke-related aphasia. The word "echolalia" is derived from the Greek ἠχώ (ēchō), meaning "echo" or "to repeat", and λαλιά (laliá) meaning "speech" or "talk" (of onomatopoeic origin, from the verb λαλέω (laléo), meaning "to talk"). Echolalia can be categorized as either immediate (occurring immediately after the stimulus) or delayed (some time after the occurrence of a stimulus). Immediate echolalia results from quick recall of information from the short-term memory and "superficial linguistic processing". A typical pediatric presentation of immediate echolalia might be as follows: a child is asked "Do you want dinner?"; the child echoes back "Do you want dinner?", followed by a pause, and then a response, "Yes. What's for dinner?" In delayed echolalia the patient repeats words, phrases, or multiple sentences after a delay that can be anywhere from hours to years later. Immediate echolalia can be indicative that a developmental disorder exists, but this is not necessarily the case. Sometimes echolalia can be observed when an individual echoes back a statement to indicate they are contemplating a response and fully heard the original statement. Mitigated echolalia refers to a repetition in which the original stimulus is somewhat altered, and ambient echolalia refers to the repetition (typically occurring in individuals with dementia) of environmental stimuli such as a television program running in the background.